Sensory studies arises at the conjuncture (and within) the fields of anthropology • sociology • history • archeology • geography • communications • religion • philosophy • literature • art history • museology • film • mixed media • performance • phenomenology • disability • aesthetics • architecture • urbanism • design

Sensory Studies can also be divided along sensory lines into, for example, visual culture, auditory culture (or sound studies), smell culture, taste culture and the culture of touch, not to mention the sixth sense (however it might be defined)

Hyperaesthetic Culture

Transformations is calling for submissions for Issue 22:
Hyperaesthetic Culture.

We live in a competitive sensory environment. The marketing of
consumer goods continually appeals to taste, touch, vision, hearing,
and smell, compelling other practices to engage our senses in what
David Howes describes as a ‘hyperaesthetic culture’. This environment
is saturated with alluring and intense sense experience that
proliferates as technologies such as ultrasonography, satellites and
computer applications provide access to things previously beyond human
perception. Bodies are cultivated to be aesthetically appealing and
optimally available to the senses for commercial, medical and security
purposes.

This special issue of Transformations will examine sensory regimes and
the way in which people respond to them. Recent cultural research into
the senses shows that the relationships and hierarchies between them
are not static. Varying sensoriums are involved in different
understandings of the self and its relationship to the world. This is
apparent in cultural studies projects that implicitly and explicitly
integrate questions of sensory experience into their investigations.

We invite submissions in the areas of philosophy, critical, cultural
and media studies, and creative arts research. Possible topics include:

–new technologies of the senses, such as haptic technologies
–the effects of sensory regimes on bodies and minds
–sensory appeal and the persistence of technologically ‘outmoded’
goods, such as vinyl records
–relationships between hyperaestheticism and thought
–sensory adaptation and substitution, such as human echolocation
–ways of making bodies and objects available to the senses, such as
body scans
–senses other than the traditional five senses, such as proprioception
–new media arts projects incorporating biometric feedback

Abstracts (500 words): due 7 December 2011 with a view to submit by 7
March 2012.
Abstracts to be forwarded to: Erika Kerruish erika.kerruish@scu.edu.au
For submission guidelines go to: www.transformationsjournal.org/journal/